


The Stilinskis' Son

by notenuffcaffeine



Series: I'm Not a Hero (We Never Are) [1]
Category: Supernatural, Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Big Brother Dean, Claudia Stilinski Feels, Claudia Stilinski's Death, F/M, Hale & Stilinski family ties, John Winchester's A+ Parenting, Origin Story, POV Claudia Stilinski, POV Dean Winchester, SPN/TW AU, Stilinski Family Feels, Time Skips, Young Dean Winchester, Young Sam Winchester, aftermath/mentions of non-con, but not what you'd expect, canon character death, claudia stilinski is a bit of a BAMF, don't sass Momma Stilinski
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-04
Updated: 2014-05-04
Packaged: 2018-01-21 20:50:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1563593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notenuffcaffeine/pseuds/notenuffcaffeine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Multiple one-shot snippets of life from Claudia Stilinski's take on her little family.  And how John Winchester's boys fit into that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Stilinskis' Son

**Author's Note:**

> shitshitshitshit. tumblr is evil. I did not ask for these feelz.
> 
> \--------

The howl on the wind wasn't as simple as trees and canyons having a bit of fun. Claudia knew it. It was a warning and she should have paid attention to it when it was real. Now it was just an echo, a shadow in her mind, a reminder that she had failed. She hugged into her coat and looked out from the Hale's porch. She felt safe now, but the knowledge that she had meddled where she shouldn't have wouldn't let her hide for the sake of her sanity. When the door opened, Claudia turned back. She saw Talia Hale standing with her five year old on her hip. The woman was her boss, a lawyer on the judge track, and Claudia was just a receptionist who had too much energy and too much curiosity and was way too good at digging up dirt.

Now she was more or less covered in it.

"Cloudy?" Talia asked. She started out onto the porch and then stopped. She called back into the house for her daughter and was soon handing the five year old Derek off to big sister Laura, only two years and a few inches taller than the boy. Laura hefted him onto her back and the pair were closed into the house, their giggles drawing Claudia's attention as Laura ran noisily away from the foyer. She startled when Talia touched her shoulder to draw her back. "Claudia, what's wrong?"

"I..." The younger woman looked down at herself, her muddy clothes, the broken buttons. She looked back to Talia, her frown somewhere between disappointed in herself and confused. "I attacked him."

"Who?" Talia's lawyer mode was coming to the fore and Claudia shook her head.

"A hunter," she said. "I thought he was aiming at you... I thought he..."

Talia tilted her head, confused. "I've been home all night... Cloudy, I told you when you found out not to get involved. Where were you? What in hell happened?"

Claudia kept shaking her head and caught Talia's arm just for someone to hold on to. "The woods. I was just walking. And I saw them, heard her talking to him. I thought it was you, Talia, I swear. And there was a flash and I just... I attacked. I just..."

"Shh, Cloudy, you're okay," said Talia softly. "I need to know though... how badly did you hurt him? Do we need to go look for him?"

Claudia couldn't help it then. Her shock and the foreign-feeling of her own bones were suddenly mocking her and she felt the laugh bubble up and escape even as tears hit her eyes. "That's just it, Talia... I don't think I hurt him," she said, barely coherent from the shocky laughter. Talia couldn't figure it out and only hugged her close, unsure what else to do to help with Claudia acting so like herself and yet still so hurt. Claudia hid there in her support for a moment and the laughter faded off into hitched breath and more tears. "I think I need to call off my wedding. I can't ask him to forgive me..."

Talia stroked her hair, tugged a leaf out of the tangles as she seemed to understand. "Cloudy. You caught yourself the best of the Stilinski men. He'll forgive you," she said. "I'll talk to him if you-"

Claudia shook her head. "No. I'm not telling him. If I can find trouble just knowing the stories are real, he'll only wind up dead. I'll just... lie."

Talia offered her a grin. "You're a terrible liar though, Cloudy."

Claudia started laughing again, nodded her agreement. "I really am."

 

\---

 

The wedding went off without a hitch, because she had married the most wonderful man on the planet. Claudia felt she really had. They spent a week in San Francisco for their honeymoon, which was never going to happen again on a deputy’s salary, especially not with a child on the way. She wasn’t showing too badly yet but that was pure chance, someone smiling down on her from somewhere just so she hadn’t had to make too many adjustments to her dress. And no one was crass enough to comment on the color.

On her honeymoon, however, her tummy was starting to enter the room first. Claudia joked that if their son kept growing so fast, she would have to tip-toe to kiss her new husband around the belly between them, like some Norman Rockwell painting. The whole being-pregnant thing was a new world, but being married to her husband was as natural as breathing and Claudia was so grateful for Talia’s convincing her not to give up because of a mistake in the woods. The significance of that mistake was still a long while off; there was no way to know whose child she carried, other than her own, and that was good enough. He would always have a father because she had married her best friend.

Said best-friend/husband was in the bathrooms at the Exploratorium when Claudia’s doubts and guilt flooded back to her. She stood at an exhibit by herself, smiling at a little boy about ten years old harassing an older brother with one of the toys from the gift shop. A slingshot with Styrofoam bullets.

“Damnit, Sammy, knock it off,” the twelve year old said, a little too loud. Claudia’s smile faded sadly as Sammy’s face lost some of the clever glee and he started aiming at the walls instead of his brother’s head.

“Dean!” A man’s voice added to the exchange and Claudia looked up suddenly. She wasn’t close enough to be noticed and caught herself just staring, seeing suddenly the hunter she had thought to forget. Of course they had children, but the man was a hunter, who hunted people, and got away with it according to everything Claudia had ever heard from Talia. Seeing the man with children was a shock. He looked up in her direction then and saw her staring. His expression was blank, then briefly confused, then angry. He caught his older son by the shoulder and moved to collect the younger one. Before she could think, Claudia was moving to meet them.

“Really?” the man snapped at her, his voice quiet but annoyance obvious. “This is not the place-”

“I just wanted to say I was sorry,” said Claudia quickly, but no less sincere. “That I don’t know what happened. And it wasn’t me...”

“Yeah, I figured that out when the siren bitch I was after took off laughing,” said the man coldly. “That doesn’t mean I want some kind of apology for it.”

Claudia withdrew slightly, her hand going protectively to her stomach out of recent habit when she was worried by something. It drew his attention to her pregnant bump and the big man’s shoulders sagged. “Shit. Don’t even -”

Claudia narrowed her eyes at him and raised her left hand, showing off the shiny wedding band rather than flip the man off. “Don’t flatter yourself,” she returned. She jumped slightly when a Styrofoam ball bounced off the man’s jacket and hit her unexpectedly.

“Sammy! I said knock it off!” The older of the two boys took the excuse to escape his father’s hold and chased after the culprit with the slingshot. Their father looked less than happy about it but he let them go, bent down to pick up the forgotten ammo. Claudia breathed a little easier. Looking off after the boys, she spotted her husband and gave him a small wave. He started around the rotunda toward them and Claudia turned her attention to the two boys’ father.

“What’s your name?” she asked him.

“Not important,” the man replied. He nodded toward her husband. “It’s taken care of.”

“That’s not why I asked,” Claudia replied, stubborn. “My husband is my son’s father and always will be. But there are still simple human courtesies and I would think in your line of work, those would be welcome. I want to know your name, that’s why I asked. Your son’s names are Sammy and Dean. I know more about them than I do you and I don’t know how you feel about that, but it bothers the hell out of me.”

The man stared at her, considering it. “John Winchester,” he said finally. Claudia stuck her hand out in the usual, expected greeting and he looked at her like she was slightly crazy. She left it out there long enough that he obliged.

“Claudia Stilinski,” she said quietly. Then, as her husband joined them, arm tucking protectively around her, she introduced the two men. Her husband wasn’t as big or intimidating a presence as John Winchester but Claudia felt still safer just having him there. She looked up at him and smiled, pointed out the two boys running around the big, circular main floor of the Exploratorium. “And those are his boys, Sammy and Dean. Trouble-makers from the looks of them,” she said. John shook his head, the first sign of a grin on his scruffy face.

“You wouldn’t actually be wrong in that,” he said.

The three stood and made small talk for a few minutes before the boys came back and asked after lunchtime. Claudia didn’t want to keep them, but she didn’t want to let John disappear just yet, the what-ifs digging at the back of her mind.

“How do I reach you?” she asked him, digging into her purse for her appointment book and a pen. John’s lightened expression hardened. He shook his head.

“You don’t,” he said. Claudia rolled her eyes.

“Fine,” she said. She nodded toward the boys. “Then should it become _relevant_ , how do I reach _them_?”

The two boys looked in confusion to their father. He looked back at them and Claudia smiled to herself as she saw the man’s resolve crumble. She held out her pen and he took her book and a number was scrawled in the margins.

“That one should work,” he said. He looked at her as he handed them back. “But I don’t expect to hear from you.”

It seemed to click for her husband then and Claudia had to wrap her free hand around his waist as his body language shifted to protective and annoyed when all she wanted was calm. She smiled for the both of them, but more for herself. If she had reason to suspect she had failed her son later, after he was born, when they would see his father’s features on a tiny little face, then she would at least make sure he had brothers. Whether John Winchester approved of that or not was not her problem. Claudia had made the choice for herself, for her husband and for her son.

 

\---

 

By the time her son was was walking, it became obvious to Claudia - and her husband - that he was the Winchester’s boy. They had seen the devilish, wide-smile joy on Sammy’s face that day in San Francisco, no matter how briefly. It was there now on their son’s face and they couldn’t overlook it. So they didn’t. A phone call and then an email to somebody named Bobby and a week later a couple of teenagers were sitting in the Stilinski’s living room, looking at their half brother. Sam was on the floor, trying to play with a baby and looking like he had never seen one before in his life. Dean sat on the couch, supervising,

Dean looked put-out. “Yeah, that’s a nickname. Cool But... How the hell do you say his name?” he asked, genuinely frustrated. Sam smirked at him.

“His name,” he parroted, because he couldn’t get the Polish to sound right either. Dean smacked the back of Sam’s head, which the two year old laughed at. So Dean swatted at his brother again and Stiles plopped onto his diapered butt and laughed until he rolled. Sam and Dean looked over at Claudia like they had done something wrong. She sighed and did the only thing she could think they might understand: swatted Dean in the back of the head just as he had to Sam, a harmless rebuke, and Stiles started giggling all over again.

John left the teens with the the Stilinskis for about a week and Claudia had never heard so much baby-laughter in her house. She couldn’t keep the teenagers, though eventually she offered when she heard Sam complain once about living in a car. The boys called their little brother on the phone after that. John was too aware that Claudia had married a sheriff’s deputy. He made sure they could check in, but he didn’t let them stay without him anymore.

A few years later Dean turned eighteen and got the car, so he started to visit on his own when they were on the west coast and he could make the excuse.

After that, Sam turned nineteen and went to school at Stanford. Stiles loved that.

But around that time, Claudia started ‘getting sick.’ Talia Hale didn’t know what was wrong with her, but they both knew it wasn’t as simple as what the doctors kept saying. It was complicated and messy and not a text-book case in every bullet-point down the list. Melissa tried to help Claudia with the things on the medical side that didn’t match up, tried to make sure Claudia got all the best doctors the west coast could offer. But it was Talia who suggested Claudia call John Winchester. Hunters knew best what they hunted and why, Talia could only try to keep up to stay just enough ahead for her family’s sake.

And then Talia was gone.

Suddenly Claudia was afraid to call John. He was too much business. The man wasn’t family. He wouldn’t try to understand. So she called Dean instead. All she did was ask him to keep an eye on his baby brother because she was worried... and Dean said he understood.

It was a few days after that phone call that Claudia woke up in the hospital again. Her husband said the nurses told him somebody named John Winchester had shown up to see her just before visiting hours closed, and that it was Dean instead of Melissa who had made sure Stiles got home safe that night since he was stuck being a deputy.

A week later Stiles told her that Sam left school and Claudia worried.

“Don’t let them disappear, baby,” Claudia told her son. She was exhausted and panicked and could focus on Stiles to keep herself going. “Family’s important. You’re their family. You can trust them.”

“I know, Mommy,” the boy replied. She smiled and hoped he would never outgrow calling her that. Or calling his dad ‘Daddy’ like he still sometimes did. “I’ll keep calling them until they answer, just like always. I’m just bummed because he was so close all the time and we could just go see him if we wanted and stuff.”

And Claudia saw the loss on her son’s face and she held onto his hand.

 

\---

 

Deputy Stilinski left the message that his wife had died on Dean’s voice-mail. He was still broken up, but Claudia had told him to be sure Dean knew. Because Stiles was their brother and would want family around after his mom died. Dean caught the hint though; Stiles wasn’t John Winchester’s boy, genetics be damned. It wasn’t like John would magically appear and swoop the kid away, and Dean and Sam were even less likely to try to do that. But Dean was more than eighty percent certain that Stilinski was drunk or at the very least hung over when he made that call. Even drunk and grieving, the deputy was a better dad than John Winchester had been, and Dean was equal parts jealous and offended by his own observation. He wasn’t worried about Stiles staying with his dad. But he and Sam were worried about the kid, just in general.

But because life sucked, it was over a month before they could get there. Sam said Stiles looked fine, he treated them like normal, but Dean saw it. There was a light gone from the Stilinski family; no matter how big Stiles smiled, it didn’t hit his eyes like it used to. He’d seen the same thing happen to Sam around the same age. Dean couldn’t fix it for Sam, so he couldn’t even try for Stiles. He didn’t even know what it was, he just knew what he saw with his own two eyes.

The deputy worked all the time, Stiles was with Scott McCall all the time, and Stiles had started doing science in the kitchen trying to learn how to cook because he didn’t like his dad eating fast food anymore. The kid was ten years old and worried about cancer, worried about diabetes, worried about how much alcohol was in the whiskey bottle on the shelf. He was just a damn kid. So Dean and Sam camped out at Stiles’ house as long as they dared, just a few days while they waited for some info on John.

Stiles didn’t throw his usual fit when they had to leave. No pointless argument trying to talk them out of it. Dean didn’t realize how often the kid had tried the trick until suddenly it wasn’t there. He just nodded and sighed when Sam told him they had to get on the road that day.

“Yeah, I know,” he said. “You wanna maybe drop me at Scotty’s on the way?”

 

\---


End file.
